The Residence (2025)

You know a movie is good when you begin to ask Google questions about it even while you’re watching it. And for me, I found myself asking Siri “how to become a detective” while watching The Residence because I was blown away. I love watching murder mysteries, so when I found out there was a whole murder mystery series, I was excited!

Overview:
During a state dinner at the White House, an unexpected murder happens, causing a wild detective to begin the most eccentric investigation ever in order to find the murderer.

She combs through about 150-plus people, more than 100 rooms, and so many scenarios just to look for whoever this murderer is and the reason why he/she did it.

During the interrogations, she finds out almost every person at the White House is a potential suspect because they all had issues with the victim, and this new information makes her pay attention to so many details she overlooked.

While paying attention to all the details, she narrows her investigation to just three rooms and the staff of the White House. So now 3 rooms, about 14 staff, and one dead body. Who committed the murder?

What I think:

First of all, hats off to the producers, directors, and all other staff who worked on this series because they actually built a whole White House for the series and handmade almost all the wallpapers in the rooms.

They even consulted the former White House professional to recreate parts of the house that aren’t known to the general public. Tell me this doesn’t deserve a standing ovation.

The actors in this series were really great. The series stars great actors like Uzo Aduba, Edwina Findley, Jason Lee, and many more. If you know Uzo Aduba, who also played Crazy Eyes in Orange Is the New Black, you’ll definitely understand that this movie is a banger. She was also the detective in this movie, and at a point, I was curious to know if she was a detective in real life because what?!

The cinematography in this movie is top-notch, and as of now, I even feel like I’ve been to the White House before because it captured all the rooms in the world’s most popular mansion very well. And I must add that my favorite scenes were the drone shots of the White House.

The script! Paul William Davies is just a genius because I’ve never paid attention to the dialogues in a series like I did to this. The conversations in this series were just too enjoyable, and the interrogations between the detective and the staff? That was a masterpiece.

At the end of the series, I was shocked to find out who the murderer was. Well, this series just confirmed something of general knowledge: sometimes, the enemy is closer than you think, and most times, the reason why that person hates you even makes no sense. I’m giving this series 9/10.